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Sharing A Lifetime Of Music & Memories Of Middlebury With Mary Voecks Volkert

photo provided Sitting at the piano at her home in Wisconsin, three year old Mary begins her exploration and love of music and the arts.

photo provided Approaching 94 and going strong, Mary continues to share her love of music, theater and the arts and cautions taxpayers and government officials alike who are thinking of eliminating any programs exposing children to the arts that this would be devastating to all involved.

Tuesday March 15, 2011

By Cookie Steponaitis

    Mary Voecks was born on October 19, 1917 in Appleton, Wisconsin and simply can not remember her life without music being a part of it. Born into a family that was “…truly blessed by a father who was an incredible provider and supporter,” Mary began her musical journey early in life, guided by her mother who taught violin and piano. Her earliest memories include, “…dancing lessons that started when she was little and expanded to include tap, ballet, and more piano lessons with her mother’s best friend who taught from her home.”

    While her father was not musical himself, Mary can remember him, “…humming to each of us children as he carried us or spent time with us. He was a man with a fifth grade education and a work ethic that few could match. He began selling meat,” explained Mary. “From that he expanded to a delicatessen and a store. He was a lovely man and truly generous.

   While I never knew the Great Depression was going on, because there was always food on our table, pap made sure that others did not go without. He adored music and would always watch us practice and listen to us play. ‘I don’t care if you play badly,’ he would tell us,” reminisced Mary. “He just wanted to hear us play and to see us dance.”

    By the time Mary was in second grade she had $100.00 in her bank account she had earned performing tap dances and routines at local group meetings of the Lions, Elks, and Masons and had a well earned reputation for being passionate about music. “I started piano at three with my mother,” shared Mary. “When I was five to nine years old that is when we concentrated also on dance lessons and taking more piano from my mother’s friend. It wasn’t until fifth grade that I found my other love, which was the flute.”

    I really didn’t know anything about the flute,” grinned Mary. “When I started playing it I just loved it. It was a part of my life from then on.” This is certainly not an exaggeration because the rest of Mary’s life included not only her husband Erie Volkert and their children, but several moves that were based on the areas of music and drama that they loved as part of their work and home life. “I was a senior in high school when I first saw Erie,” Mary shared. “My speech teacher took a leave and this handsome young man from Lawrence College came over to teach the class for the rest of the semester. He was very handsome and exceedingly talented. Well, enough said in that area.”

   The couple was married in 1939 and shared not only their love of family, drama and music, but art as well for the next fifty-eight years until Erie’s death in 1997.  They moved several times in the first years of their marriage and Erie accepted positions teaching drama at colleges in South Dakota and Virginia before a 1941 opening brought them to Middlebury College and the community they would call home. “Coming from the Midwest,” remembered Mary, “We had never heard of Middlebury College and we learned of the position because Erie had accepted the director position at a camp for students at Brown Ledge in Mallets Bay, Vermont. He interviewed and we came to Vermont permanently in 1941. He taught over thirty-five years for Middlebury as well as their summer programs at Bread Loaf. While he taught, I worked as a secretary to the president of the college, played flute in the Vermont Symphony Orchestra and taught flute and beginning piano on the side. When the children came, we worked it all together. It was a wonderful period in our lives and one full of music.”

     Joining the family were four children Jennifer (1943), Lawrence (1945), Randall (1950) and Lisa (1958). While only Lawrence still lives in the Middlebury area, all of the children grew up to love music and made it and drama a part of their lives as well. The faculty provided a wonderful environment for Mary and her family and the close community also brought into her life more artists of depth and talent to share with. “I loved to paint,” reflected Mary, “and while I was quite good at it, I never planned on it as a career. It was another facet of the arts that I explored and loved so much.”

    With all the changes that her generation has experienced, Mary was quick to point out her father’s keen eye for technology as part of her appreciation for changes in America. “We had the first car in Appleton,” she shared, “and my father was greatly in support of technology. He could make the thirty minute drive to her mother’s house in the car that would have taken up more than three quarters of the day by wagon. I remember neighbors coming over to look at the first electric refrigerator we had in the town and we were the first children to have zip up boots. Papa not only appreciated technology, but he invested in it.”

    Today, as Mary approaches her 94th birthday and celebrates her family including four children, eight grandchildren, two great grandchildren and a third to be born in the spring, she is remarkably animated, spry and just as passionate about music as she was at three years old sitting on her mother’s lap for the first time at the piano. When asked about the recent remarks about cutting programs in schools for the arts Mary wisely and loudly expressed her concerns. “I am furious and believe it would be the greatest mistake to cut art programs from the schools. The arts lead to scholarships, expanded horizons and depth in people that is important to our culture and country today. Whether it was my piano, flute, dancing or singing, both Erie and I were passionate about what the arts can do for people and for every generation. Besides,” chuckles Mary, “All that deep breathing for singing and instruments, all that oxygen intake, is probably why I am still in such good health at 94!”

    In good health indeed and in good voice as well! Spending time with Mary Voecks Volkert is like listening to a symphony play one of her favorite pieces by Mozart. It quietly incorporates into the melody a changing of chords, a bold rich tone and then crescendos with the power and passion that music and musicians make when they come together. “The arts were my thing as well as his,” remarked Mary about her fifty-eight year partnership with husband Erie.  A partnership that benefitted countless college students, her own family and those who she taught, worked with and shared with her the passion for dance, music, and the arts. Vermont has a strong tradition of attracting artists of all types and the Green Mountains to this day resonate with the riches of the arts in all of our lives. Thanks Mary Volkert for being a part of that tradition for close to sixty years!

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